False Witness

by Michelle Davies

  She couldn’t bring herself to contradict him.

  ‘I won’t apologize for trying to inject some rational thinking into this case,’ Byford added. ‘Because right now it doesn’t look like anyone else is going to.’

  38

  Julia barely slept again and the fitful night left its mark with dark circles under her eyes and a foul mood she couldn’t shake off as she made breakfast. Pancakes, Poppy’s favourite, meant to be a treat and something to take their minds off what was happening. Instead, the formality of them sitting round the table together on a Friday morning simply reinforced the grim turn their life had taken.

  ‘You’ll break the plates if you slam them down any harder,’ remarked Ewan as she laid the table.

  ‘You do it then,’ she said, dropping the stack in front of him.

  Ewan swore, then threw his phone onto the table with a loud clatter, making them all jump. Immediately she apologized.

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to snap,’ she said. ‘I didn’t get much sleep.’

  ‘Neither did I but you don’t see me using you as a verbal punchbag,’ said Ewan. ‘Nor am I complaining that I’ve got a ton of work to do and should be seeing a client to sign off the deal I’ve been working on for six months, but because you can’t cope I’m staying at home.’

  ‘I’m really grateful you are,’ said Julia, wishing desperately she’d kept her mouth shut.

  Ewan shot her a look and returned to checking his emails.

  The kitchen door swung open and Julia’s father, Malcolm, walked in.

  ‘Surprise!’ he shouted.

  ‘Grandpa!’ shrieked Poppy, shooting out of her chair and racing across the kitchen with Dylan in hot pursuit. Julia smiled as she watched them fling their arms around him.

  ‘Good morning, Malcolm,’ chuckled Ewan. ‘Did you sleep well?’

  ‘Like a king,’ said his father-in-law, slapping him on the shoulder.

  ‘Tea or coffee?’ Julia asked him.

  ‘A decent cuppa would be great. That’s the one downside of living in Spain – dismal tea.’

  The children retook their seats and resumed their breakfast.

  ‘Everything all right?’ said Malcolm, glancing between his daughter and son-in-law.

  ‘We’re fine, Dad,’ said Julia, worried he’d picked up on the tension between them.

  Malcolm didn’t look convinced.

  ‘I was thinking, why don’t we go down to The Puddle today and hire one of the boats? My treat. Then Ewan can get on with a bit of work while we’re out.’

  Ewan looked pleased, but Julia shook her head. She didn’t think another outing was appropriate. What if the police wanted to talk to Poppy and they weren’t at home when they called?

  ‘I think we should stay here today,’ she said.

  ‘Well, that’s a selfish attitude,’ said Ewan. ‘I need to work, your dad wants to spend time with you and the children, and they love boating. Blimey, isn’t Mummy being a right selfish so-and-so today?’

  As the children chimed in to agree with him, Julia could feel her resentment building. Why did she always have to be the bad guy in every scenario?

  ‘Fine, we’ll go,’ she snapped.

  As the children cheered and Dylan began excitedly discussing with Malcolm whether they should hire a boat shaped like a swan or a dragon, Julia glared at her husband, but he was already too absorbed in his phone to notice.

  The boats were hired from a cafe next to The Puddle, which, despite its nickname, was in fact a large, man-made lake. As they stepped inside the cafe, Julia was overwhelmed with apprehension that they might run into someone they knew and as they joined the queue at the counter her fears were realized: two mums she recognized from Rushbrooke’s PTA were chatting animatedly at one of the tables, two half-drunk lattes in front of them. One made eye contact with Julia and her expression changed from friendly to hostile in a heartbeat as she dug an elbow into her friend’s ribs and cocked her head in their group’s direction.

  Julia smiled feebly but both women shot her a look of disgust. Malcolm must’ve seen it because he squeezed Julia’s arm.

  ‘Don’t say anything, love,’ he whispered. ‘They want you to react and if you do you’ll make things worse.’

  Her heart swelled with gratitude that he was there to support her. It hadn’t been until she was an adult that she’d grasped how similar she and her dad were. Despite how overbearing he could be, he always walked away at the first sign of conflict too. It was probably what infuriated her mum so much about their marriage – Malcolm always got the last word because he walked away before she’d had the chance to say it.

  ‘You know what they say,’ said one of the mums in a loud voice to her companion. ‘Liars breed liars. Like mother, like daughter.’

  ‘Is she talking about you, Mummy?’ Dylan asked, his little face pinched with worry. ‘Why is she saying that?’

  ‘Probably because of what Benji’s mum’s been saying,’ said Poppy with a matter-of-factness that left Julia stunned.

  ‘What do you mean?’ she croaked.

  ‘Samira told me that Lucie’s mum had messaged Benji’s mum and she said she never bullied you at school and you’re making it up.’

  Julia burned with anger. Lucie’s mum was Tess, the playground gossip – trust her to wheedle her way in with Imogen.

  ‘When did you speak to Samira?’ she asked, trying to keep her temper in check.

  ‘We FaceTimed last night.’

  It hadn’t occurred to Julia that Poppy might’ve been in touch with her friends while all this was going on. She was usually strict about how much screen time the children had and monitored their online communication, but amid all the stress and upset she hadn’t been as vigilant in the past couple of days.

  ‘It’s probably not a good idea to be chatting to your friends about Benji or his mum while the police are still investigating his death,’ Malcolm said.

  ‘Did you make it up?’ asked Dylan curiously.

  Julia stared at her son, flabbergasted.

  ‘No, I did not. It’s not often I say this about someone, but she is not a nice person.’

  ‘She’s lovely to me. I really like her,’ said Poppy nonchalantly.

  The statement was so unexpected it punched the breath from Julia’s lungs. On seeing her reaction, Malcolm took Dylan by the hand.

  ‘Let’s wait outside while these two sort out the boat hire.’ When Dylan protested he said, ‘Don’t worry, you’ll get your dragon.’

  Julia barely noticed them leaving as she stared at her daughter.

  ‘You think Imogen is lovely?’

  Poppy gave a shrug. ‘Yes.’

  Julia was shocked by how betrayed she felt.

  ‘Nicer than me?’

  When Poppy didn’t answer, Julia burned with fury. That bitch smarming over her child, pretending to be nice. The thought made her skin crawl.

  ‘Has she said something to you about me?’ said Julia, raising her voice.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Go on, what has she said?’

  Poppy looked uncomfortable and shuffled awkwardly on the spot. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ Julia scoffed. ‘What the hell has Imogen been saying?’

  Poppy threw her mum a look of defiance, then started walking away. Without thinking, Julia grabbed her by the upper arm and pulled her back.

  ‘Ouch!’ Poppy yelped.

  ‘Tell me what she said.’

  ‘Let go, you’re hurting me!’

  But Julia held on, determined to get an answer out of her. Then she heard a voice behind her.

  ‘Madam, I think you should let her go,’ said a heavily accented voice.

  She turned to be confronted by the white-haired Italian man who’d been serving behind the counter. His face was veiled with disapproval and immediately Julia relaxed her grip.

  ‘I wasn’t –’ she stuttered, aware of how bad it looked and horrified the owner had come over to stop her.r />
  ‘You were hurting her,’ he said.

  Only then did Julia notice the cafe had come to a standstill and everyone was staring at her. Her gaze immediately fell on the two mums, who were both looking at her as if she’d suddenly grown another head.

  One turned to the other.

  ‘See, it’s like I said – like mother, like daughter.’

  39

  Maggie went in search of Renshaw and found her in the ladies’ toilet washing her hands.

  ‘Hey, are you okay?’

  Renshaw was looking ahead into the mirror so it was her reflection that answered.

  ‘Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?’

  ‘Byford should never have spoken to you like that,’ said Maggie. ‘We all told him so.’

  ‘I don’t need you defending me.’

  There it was, a flash of the old Renshaw, the one that used to make their working environment so combative and fraught that Maggie couldn’t stand her. With a start Maggie knew she would do anything for them not to regress to that.

  ‘I know you don’t,’ she said. ‘But if I think someone’s being a prick to the SIO I’m not going to sit back and say nothing.’

  Renshaw’s reflection grinned.

  ‘Thanks. Where is he now?’

  ‘Downstairs in the car park. I told him to wait there until I was ready.’

  ‘Good.’ Renshaw wiped her hands dry with a paper towel. ‘Can you do me a favour? I was going to call the mum who sent Imogen that message about the fight between Poppy and Benji, but I’ve only got half an hour before we go up to Rushbrooke with the dogs and I need to pop to the chemist. I feel like crap; I think it’s something I’ve eaten.’

  Renshaw did look a bit peaky now she mentioned it, her pale skin more wan than usual against her auburn hair.

  ‘Do you need to go home?’

  ‘No, it’s not that bad, it comes and goes. I just need something to settle my stomach.’

  ‘What’s the mum’s name?’

  ‘Tess Edwards. Her contact details should’ve been uploaded to the case file.’

  ‘I’ll go and do it now. Good luck with the search.’

  ‘Thanks. We need a breakthrough and I’m hoping this’ll be it.’

  Tess Edwards answered her phone on the second ring and became animated when Maggie introduced herself.

  ‘I did wonder if Imogen might pass on my message,’ she trilled.

  ‘I was hoping you could tell me more about the fight between Benji and Poppy,’ said Maggie.

  ‘Well, according to my daughter Lucie the pair of them had to be separated in the cloakroom outside their class. They really went for it: hair pulling, the works.’

  ‘Does your daughter know what the row was about?’

  ‘It sounded quite trivial, to be honest. Poppy accused Dylan of knocking into her, then she accused him of telling lies for attention. She was quite het up, apparently. Lucie didn’t know what the supposed lies were and I don’t think any of the other kids knew either.’

  ‘You said in your message that it wasn’t the first time Poppy had lashed out at school and –’ Maggie had a screenshot of the text in front of her – ‘she could be a “right madam”.’

  Tess noisily sucked in a breath.

  ‘Oh, it sounds really spiteful when you say it like that.’

  ‘But that is what you said, isn’t it?’

  ‘Well, yes.’

  ‘Why do you think she’s a madam?’

  ‘Because of something else that happened at school. But I’m a bit embarrassed to talk about it, because Lucie was involved too.’

  ‘I just need to know what Poppy did.’

  ‘Well, one of the girls in their class had a notebook which she took into the playground and some of them started writing horrible things in it about the other kids – descriptions of how they looked,’ said Tess.

  ‘Poppy was writing the comments?’

  ‘No, that was Lucie and her friends. I know, it’s awful, but I did tell her off when the school told me. She had no iPad time for a week as a punishment.’

  ‘What was Poppy’s involvement then?’

  ‘She heard about the book and confronted the girls. They hadn’t even written anything about her and offered to show her, but she didn’t believe them. She started yelling at them and then she punched the girl whose notebook it was.’

  ‘She punched her? Was the girl hurt?’

  ‘Yes, she had a black eye. Poppy got away with it though.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘The teachers came running, obviously, but Poppy said it was an accident and that she’d raised her arm to get the girl’s attention and it grazed her eye, so the head let her off with a warning to play nicely. But it was no accident, believe me.’

  ‘You presumably weren’t there, so how can you be so sure?’

  ‘Because I believe Lucie and she said Poppy definitely punched the girl.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘Just before Christmas.’

  Before Benji joined the school, Maggie noted.

  ‘Is there anything else you can tell me that might be useful to our investigation?’

  Tess pondered for a moment. ‘Not that I can think of right now.’

  ‘Do you know Poppy’s parents at all?’

  ‘I know Ewan because he does most of the school runs. But Julia we don’t see that often.’ Tess paused. ‘You know about her, don’t you?’

  ‘That depends what you mean,’ said Maggie evenly.

  ‘About her not being well.’

  ‘She’s ill?’

  ‘Not now. But she was when Poppy was little. Ewan said he had to do everything. She was in bed the whole time.’

  ‘What was wrong with her?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t think it’s my place to say.’

  But that’s not going to stop you, thought Maggie shrewdly, and she was right.

  ‘It was depression,’ Tess ploughed on. ‘Quite severe by the sounds of it; enough for social services to keep an eye on her, anyway.’

  ‘Ewan told you this?’

  ‘Oh, yes, he’s been quite open about it. It was obviously very tough for him, having to carry the can for both of them. He’s a great dad, though, terrific with both the kids.’

  Maggie’s mind flashed back to Tuesday evening and the comment posted on Facebook.

  ‘Someone has indicated to us that Poppy’s home life could be volatile. Do you know anything about that?’

  Tess sounded shocked. ‘No, I don’t. I would be amazed, though. Ewan’s not the sort.’

  ‘Sort?’

  ‘He doesn’t come across like someone who loses his temper or is a bit handy with his fists.’

  Maggie winced at the crude description.

  ‘I’ve never heard him so much as raise his voice to the kids,’ Tess added.

  ‘I’ve heard he’s very strict with them,’ said Maggie, remembering what Imogen had said.

  ‘He’ll tell them off but he’s not rough with them. If I had to say either of them was the nasty type, I’d say it was Julia, no question. You can tell by looking at her she’s moody.’

  Maggie could see they were heading down a conversational cul-de-sac. As much as she wanted the police to think so, Tess didn’t know what went on inside the Hepworths’ house and her comments were guesswork.

  ‘I think that’s all the questions I have for now,’ Maggie said. ‘You’ve been really helpful. If anything else occurs to you please give me a call.’

  She recited her direct phone line for Tess to take down, then hung up as Byford appeared in the doorway looking pissed off.

  ‘I’ve been waiting downstairs for ages.’

  ‘Sorry, I had to make a call, and now I’ve got to check something else with Burton – can you give me another minute?’

  With a sigh, Byford threw himself into the chair at his desk.

  ‘What do you need to check?’

  ‘He was meant to be speaking to social services to see if t
he Hepworths are known to them.’ She quickly told him what Tess had said about Julia being depressed and how she suggested she might be aggressive.

  ‘Why does it matter if she was?’ asked Byford.

  ‘It’s a known fact that children raised in violent households are more likely to commit acts of violence themselves,’ said Maggie. ‘If there’s a pattern of behaviour that might’ve influenced Poppy we need to know about it.’

  ‘So you do want her to be guilty,’ said Byford.

  Maggie bristled. ‘I want to be satisfied I’ve done my job by looking at every possibility. You should try it.’ Irritated by what he’d said, she decided to change the subject. ‘By the way, Omana dropped a document off for you last night. It’s in your in-tray.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Byford leaned over, picked up the envelope and ripped it open. Whatever was detailed on the document triggered him to raise his eyebrows, then he slid the paper back inside.

  ‘Anything important?’ asked Maggie.

  ‘Nope.’

  Byford unlocked his bottom desk drawer to toss the envelope inside. The drawer was one of those deep ones that could accommodate hanging files but there was nothing in it except two notebooks: one A5 size and patterned with footballs, the other slim and covered in flowers.

  ‘Footballs and flowers?’ Maggie queried with a smile.

  Byford shrugged. ‘That’s me, a mass of contradictions.’

  With a bang he slid the drawer shut, then locked it.

  40

  Alan was taking a break in his usual spot, at a picnic table adjacent to the playing field. Normally it would be assembly at this time and he’d either be lurking at the back of the hall or using the minutes to complete a repair in one of the classrooms while they were empty. But with the school still closed to pupils there seemed little point sticking to routine. No one was going to berate him today for having an early, unscheduled tea break.